Debbie Watkins

Debbie Watkins is the Managing Director, Fern Software APMEA, a leading global fintech solutions provider. Debbie has over 20 years of experience in technology for financial inclusion, mobile-enabled products and services, business and strategy consulting and management. She has led customer-centric market research and product development engagements; supported clients in technology platform needs assessment and implementation; built multi-disciplinary and multi-cultural teams in a number of countries; and acted as Project Director for a number of long-term multi-million dollar mobile money and financial services solution implementations. She has lived in Cambodia, Laos, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Singapore for a total of 14 years, and worked in 20+ additional countries throughout Africa and Asia. Her career in the UK included Operations Director for an ERP solutions provider and Head of Deployment for a commercial bank-enabled smart card-based electronic cash service. As Managing Director of Fern Software’s regional hub office in Singapore, Debbie is responsible for Asia Pacific, the Middle East and Africa.  She leads teams in Australia, India and Singapore. Fern has clients in over 40 countries who use its banking and cloud-based systems to provide savings, loans and insurance services to over 2 million customers. It provides a range of solutions for SACCOs, credit unions, MFIs and banks that are flexible, powerful and easy to use – empowering financial service providers to deliver affordable, accessible and relevant products to urban and rural populations.